This section is intended to provide a background or context to the invention that is recited in the claims. The description herein may include concepts that could be pursued, but are not necessarily ones that have been previously conceived or pursued. Therefore, unless otherwise indicated herein, what is described in this section is not prior art to the description and claims in this application and is not admitted to be prior art by inclusion in this section.
In recent years, flat panel televisions have become enormously popular in both commercial and residential sectors. As the prices for plasma and liquid crystal display (LCD) flat panel displays have continued to fall, and the quality for the same devices have improved, more and more businesses and individuals have purchased such devices for both home and business purposes.
One of the advantages of flat panel television units that customers have found particular appealing is their relatively low thickness. Because conventional “tube” televisions have a relatively large depth, the display options for such devices are quite limited. In the residential setting, most users require a television stand or large entertainment center to store the television. Such stands or entertainment centers can take up significant floor space, which is often undesirable. In the commercial or educational setting, users will often install large overhead mounting systems that can contain the television.
Flat panel displays, on the other hand, may be mounted directly to a wall or other surface. With these considerations in mind, there have been various attempts to develop systems that address mounting of flat panel display devices. Various adjustable display mounts have been developed that permit adjustment of the position and/or orientation of the attached display in various degrees of freedom. Some of these adjustable mounts permit a user to move aspects of the mount to reposition the location of a display in space relative to a mounting surface. Other mounts allow an attached display to pivot about an axis and/or provide for adjustment of the rotational (i.e., skew) and/or tilt orientation of the display. Such display mounts enable gross positioning of a display device to obtain a preferred viewing position and orientation for the device relative to a viewer.